Defrag Blog

I’m staring at the first draft of the Defrag agenda — a beast that slouchingly comes to life (sorry, I’m channeling Yeats this morning) via countless conversations, happenstance and assorted bits of magic — and some early themes are emerging. So, I thought I’d share.

First off, I should mention what I know about our early keynoters: Jeff Jonas (Chief Scientist, IBM) will be doing a presentation that goes something like, “Organizations are getting dumber, and IT’s to blame”; while Alex Wright (author of Glut) will be exploring “secondary orality” and the tension emerging between oral and literary styles of interaction in social networks (yea, wrap your noggin around that one!). I’ll post more on other keynote presentations as they develop.

Topically, I’ve outlined a few areas that keep popping up as things to focus on (these are evolving, and probably not worded correctly, so bear with me): Data Integration, Analytics and BI, Communication Metaphors, Interfaces and Usability, Mobility and Learning, Beyond Collaboration, The Rise of the Social Customer, Cracking Open the Data Backbone, Crowdsourcing, and Semantics and Meta-data. I’m using these topics to organize the sessions.

Specific sessions that have gotten placed include:

Information as Seen Through the Eyes of A Foodie

Tech Marketing, Usability and the Boomers (a discussion)

Integrating What Ya Got: Overcoming the Adoption Gap

Employing Semantics Across Activity Streams

Beyond Structured Data: The Fuzzy Edge of Business Intelligence and Social Media Analytics

Scaling Feedback Loops for Improved Performance and Happier People

When Education Goes Mobile

Spam in the Age of Social

When Users Are All on Facebook: The Consumerization of IT

…and I am truly just getting started.

Ask yourself: what if this year’s Defrag stretched your mind in so many ways that you left more creative, productive, innovative and ahead of the game? What if a tech conference could have a direct impact on your life? That’s what we’re working on. You should join us and find out.